Friday, July 27, 2012

Friday's practice round at Laguna Seca e-Power/TTX

Due to a little SNAFU in charging my electric car, I wasn't able to make it to the track today, however I have my press pass and will be there bright and early tomorrow. In the meantime I see the TTXGP crew have posted a race report which you can read at http://www.egrandprix.com/news.php?id=290

The thing which stands out is that Lightning Motors best time was pretty close to Steve Rapp's best time last year with the Mission Motors bike. Their best time was nearly fast enough to qualify for MotoGP bikes. Michael Barnes is quoted saying this about his performance: Michael Barnes: “We were a little behind the eight ball today and went out on a bike that was not as good as I know it should be. We didn't have a chance to put tyre warmers on so the bike was cold, and improvements need to be made with the suspension and geometry wise. Having said that there were definitive improvements to the bikes handling since Infineon our speed is strong as it always has been and the handling is getting each time better when we are out on the track. My goal this weekend was to beat Rapps’ qualifying time from last year as I know the bike is capable. We are close today in the free practice and hope to close the gap in tomorrow's Qualifier but I am not sure we will have that magic set up that we are working toward.”

While Brammo brought two bikes, one of them was having its own SNAFU ("going in reverse") and wasn't able to go out for the practice round.

The Zero guys are again riding unmodified Zero S's which I find surprising given that the FIM staff have enforced a 20% rule the last two years. This is a standard feature in motorcycle racing, and is meant to ensure the bikes on the grid are close in power. I've seen the FIM staff disqualify teams which they'd paid to have flown from Europe. The Zero S's are so much slower than the top bikes, that they'll surely fall afoul of this rule...? We'll see tomorrow after the qualifying round. UPDATE: As we see in the comments below, Jeremiah Johnson informs us that if Barnes beats Rapp's time from last year, then the cutoff is 1:49. Which cuts out several of the teams listed below. And, by the way, now that we mention Jay, why isn't he in this results list? I'll have to find that out tomorrow.